There is no solution to the on-going miseries of the Aborigine population that does not entail assimilation - realistically the debate should centre around the means of accomplishing that assimilation. Every ethnic group in the world has faced, or will have to face, that same circumstance. Our own culture was sufficiently flexible to amalgamate with the post-war European immigration, but the 'hybrid' culture that resulted now faces either assimilation or annihilation - take your pick - in the face of the ever growing Chinese onslaught. The australian Aborigines cannot exist as a 'culture within a culture'. Economics always has and always will maintain forward momentum, and the less economically viable will assimilate or go under.

The most beautifully written article for a long, loooong time!

"Now the current weapons mobilised in that war, the new psychological weapon of violent pornography, and the longer-term biochemical weapon of alcohol - these real weapons of mass destruction - are “discovered” and the Indigenous people have to be saved from them."

" the epicentre of pornography is the ACT suburb of Fyshwick, less than three kilometres from Parliament House; the government extracts huge revenues from the alcohol excises it collects."

You split the arrow Robin. Can we join you in the greenwood?

Inspirational...

An excellent essay Andrew.

I was especially taken by your comment that: "Australian society needs to declare that it wants to make peace, and to espouse a peace plan". And the conditions that would have to be met to achieve that plan: "It requires a vision of real Indigenous economic development based on the capacity to realise the value extracted from Indigenous lands by our forebears. It means removing the weapons of mass destruction - the epicentre of pornography is the ACT suburb of Fyshwick, less than three kilometres from Parliament House; the government extracts huge revenues from the alcohol excises it collects."

Such a vision would have to crystalise out of the fog of lies historically fed to the Australian people the majority of whom are focussed on matters they see as more important to them.

Your conclusion: "... it means having a government that commits itself to ending the war and that orientation depends on a people who want peace. Whether they do, is a question all Australians will have to answer for themselves" is vastly problematic. Howard's mob is and always will be categorically incapable of conceptualising the issues in those terms and Rudd's mob has lost its capacity to do much more than what is 'safe' and not too different from the way we've always done them.

Australians of good-will and vision, Indigenous and non-Indigenous together, will have to work around that massive impediment and achieve change despite governments, for the foreseable future. A people's movement for justice may eventually shift government hypocrisy...but that's a long way off.

The best laugh I've had in ages. Thanks Andrew.

You can put your pants back on now.

Unfortunately the only realistic approach to indigenous affairs is assimilation not separation. The latter approach has not worked in the 20th C and will not work in the 21st C. Demanding indigenous people 'retain their traditional way of life' is a nonsense that they could do without. From my discussions with them they have the same aspirations as anyone else but they aren't being given the opportunities because a small activist group decided on issues like 'land rights' and 'maintaining indigenous languages and culture'. I am told that a lot of what passes for traditional culture is nothing of the sort and that indigenous languages need a massive vocabulary input to cope with the modern world.
Another example of politically correct activism doing more harm than good?

Oh what a sad and angry individual Andrew Jakubowicz seems.

“Sexual abuse of Indigenous children is horrific. It has been going on and been reported on for a long time: indeed its unpoliced history demonstrates yet another of the war’s weapons of neglect and disavowal.”

So he complains when something is done, as well as when something is supposedly not done (the “each way bet” of the terminally cynical).

I agree with communicat.

Are we to assume the author supports the notion that indigenous people should not be assimilated into the wider Australian community and should not share the supposedly better living conditions and life expectancy, which is supposedly common in that wider Australian community?

Aboriginal culture represents one which has, like many others, been conquered and colonised. Other assimilated examples, the Huns, Vandals, Saxons, Angles, Celts and hosts of others over the centuries.

I note some wax lyrical at the prose of this piece of dross.

Personally, I find it the unimaginative swill of a lazy mind which criticises what is done by its betters from the secluded tenure of academia. Academia, where it is secure for subsistence and left with so much time on their idle hands that they can conjure up this meaningless drivel.

Thanks, Col Rouge - the last paragraph says it all. Your remarks are particularly pertinent to (presumeably) tenured sociology lecturers -an especially useless example of an especially useless discipline. Get a job Andrew - try the student union cafeteria. Better still, get a life. Even better, take the money and run so that we can train a doctor/nurse/scientist/engineer with the change.

What intellectual giants we meet on OLO postings!

GYM-FISH takes us back to the failed policies of assimilation and stirs in some silly paranoia – it’s “either assimilation or annihilation - take your pick - in the face of the ever growing Chinese onslaught”.

grn can only laugh at his own fancied homoerotica.

Communicat gives us ancient false assertions based on what he calls “my discussions with them [Indigenous people]” and from what “I am told”.

Col Rouge offers a pop-psychology personality assessment: “Oh what a sad and angry individual Andrew Jakubowicz seems.”

These tired foot soldiers of a long-discredited assimilationism show no understanding of Jakubowicz’ argument and so are in no position to engage with his ideas.

Bereft of imagination and conceptual insight, they retreat to the old familiar attacks on academics. They can’t even recognize their own self-parody in the hypocritical attacks on “unimaginative swill of a lazy mind”. Lazy minds indeed.

Once again the pseudo-intellectuals rant and rave against assimilation. Lets face it, the ones who have done the best are the "Stolen Generation" who have been assimilated into the rest of society. I hope some of you watched the "Four Corners" program that showed what Noel Pearson is trying to do for the people of Cape York. He seems to be fighting a losing battle against the forces of alcohol which has been made available because the do-gooder academics are bereft of any constructive ideas. At the present time there are many Aboriginal communities who don't need the whites to do anything towards wiping themselves out, they are doing a good job of it themselves.

Gym-fish, Communicat and Col Rouge are all on the ball, the rest of you might as well crawl back under your rocks.

As a comment on the article I'd prefer to quote the words of Noel Pearson, interviewed on Lateline 26 June 2007:

"It will depend on Indigenous people at the end of the day asking themselves and answering the question, asking themselves whether they believe the integrity and wellbeing of their children is the number one priority in the world, and if it is, if it is, let's understand that everything happens within a political context. Of course this is a political context. Of course we don't like that person and we don't, we don't like that party and we don't - we suspect that person's motives and so on, but geez, the imperative here is the protection of our children and we as Indigenous people have got to ask ourselves the hard question - do we put the protection of our children ahead of everything else? Ahead of the fact - ahead of the question as to whether we like the Prime Minister, or we don't like the Prime Minister, or we like that Government or we don't like that Government.

I mean, quite frankly I couldn't care less whether John Howard or Kevin Rudd ruled this world. My priority is to take advantage for immediate intervention for the protection of children."

'Nuff said?

Can anybody actually explain what the author means when he says of Australian society

"It requires a vision of real indigenous economic development based on the capacity to realise the value extracted from indigenous lands by our forebears"?

Ah I was not expecting shared support for my view when I read the earlier posts so thank you later posters for your expressions of support for the view.

FrankGol “Bereft of imagination and conceptual insight, they retreat to the old familiar attacks on academics. They can’t even recognize their own self-parody in the hypocritical attacks on “unimaginative swill of a lazy mind”. Lazy minds indeed.”

Ah well, we would expect no more from Frank, that less versed old slapper.

When I am criticised by the likes of you, Frank, I know I am backing a winner.

Now – “imagination” and “conceptual insight”, I challenge you to define how people like myself are so limited, unlike you, I don’t travel with the herd (that’s the socialists mantra and the lowest band on Maslow’s hierarchy).

By choice, I work on short term contracts and so can demonstrate my worth to my clients by the fact that they can terminate my services at a moments notice (but don’t). I am happy for any academic to qualify and quantify the worth of their “tenure” and wonder how many would “hang on to their stipends” if faced with the commercially competitive environment in which I deal.

As for “lazy” minds.
Nothing of your post has exceeded the imaginative rhetoric which you picked up from quoting me. That, in itself, reflects negatively on the vigour and dexterity of your synapses

Have a nice day

palimpsest

I would suggest that the essence of the author's statement speaks to the duality and interrelatedness of just compensation for the expropriation of lands (including income-earning histories and unfulfilled capabilities) and the necessary societal willingness to equitably (dare I say affirmatively) encourage meaningful economies (underpinned by intergovernmental amendments to definitive mechanisms, such as the Trade Practices Act and National Competition Policy), based on the sustainable management of indigenous (particularly natural, cultural and intellectual) resources.

Neil, run that past us again in words of one syllable. My brain can't cope with long words today. Must be having a "Seniors' Moment".

Sorry VK3AUU - the complexity of my previous post is preposterous, but in single syllable simplicity, I cannot improve on the author's question "How do we end the war?" Indeed, as a nation, do we or do we not genuinely want peace?

Does the author mean that if the government tries to stamp out child abuse ,it is wrong . Or does he mean that if the government does not interfere ,it is wrong?
Those who long ago perpetuated the Noble Warrior dreamtime myth ,have created a system of aparthied in Australia that has seen Aboriginal children held back from becoming as other Australian children.
They are growing up in primitive communities where,at best, there are no opportunities, or at worst ,they are victims of older paedophiles.
And is that what the activists want?

Neil, are you taking the piss?

Col Rouge says: “I challenge you to define how people like myself are so limited, unlike you, I don’t travel with the herd…”

Let’s get the herd out of the way first.

VK3AU sorts that out for us: “Gym-fish, Communicat and Col Rouge are all on the ball, the rest of you might as well crawl back under your rocks.” Look around Col, the herd are travelling with you, and all singing the same old song of assimilation.

“There is no solution to the on-going miseries of the Aborigine population that does not entail assimilation…,” croons GYM-FISH.

“Unfortunately the only realistic approach to indigenous affairs is assimilation not separation,’ chants Communicat.

VK3AU takes up the melody line: “…the ones who have done the best are the ‘Stolen Generation’ who have been assimilated into the rest of society.”

And finally in you come Col with the chorus: “Aboriginal culture represents one which has, like many others, been conquered and colonized.”

But, I have to tell you Col, the assimilationist song is so old it went out of copyright fifty years ago. You need to change the record or employ a new lyricist.

If you want a gig where people will listen to your songs, your barber shop quartet had better get in the time machine and skip right through the 20th century and come straight into the 21st century where they’ve been singing new songs for a while now.

Assimilation is soooooo monophonic. No one listens to that stuff anymore.

I live in Darwin. Two nights ago I went out for dinner with my partner at our local club. On the steps outside the club were two little Indigenous children, I would say about 2 and 4 years old. No parents around. Both children had really dirty runny noses and their skin was covered in what looked like scabies. They were eating stale old twisties out of a cigarette butt ashtray. Their parents were inside drunk. When I told the parents their children were eating from the ashtray, I was called a white p----ck.
Very sad.

Palimpsest,

Homeland indigenous communities have major stakeholder interests in environmental management and tourism economies and yet budgetary allocations for the former are almost entirely issued to government land management agencies, whilst the latter is subsidised to the hilt to enjoy exclusionary access advantages to publicly-owned reserves. Neither the ACCC nor other Australian Competition Councils regard the environmental functions and mandates of government land management agencies as business activities; therefore, they are not required to maintain competitive neutrality. In addition, Section 51 of the Trade Practices Act 1974 essentially provides that regard will not be had to conduct which is specifically authorised or approved by any federal legislation or by specific state or territory regulation, regardless of their exclusionary influences to fair trade upon non-government tenures.

Head-to-head, in environmental management stakes, indigenous Australia out-performs non-indigenous Australia, two-hundred to one and yet, as a nation, who do we pay to look after the natural environment? Bureaucrats, who have wavered so far from delegated function that they have become variously known as the Sparks and Wildfire Service.

Good one, GYM-FISH. Sorry I came to this debate a bit late - but I agree completely with your sentiments re sociology and sociology "lecturers". However, better not suggest Andy takes a change of employment in the cafeteria: a post-modernist in the kitchen would be worse than Reds-under-the-beds.

Sociology lecturers are generally arm-chair activists, who bemoan daily that the Wall came down, forcing them to transfer their Cold War rhetoric to less dramatic focii, while comfortably taking money from some unaware university. (Can't call it "wages": that implies "work" is being done.)

Hey, Andy! Do you really think the Aboriginal proletariat will rise to your call to arms??

Assimilation is soooooo monophonic. No one listens to that stuff anymore.

Frankgol, that is the reason they are still in the S-h-i-t. They are not listening to the people who might have a solution to their problems and they just expect it all to fall into their laps like manna from heaven, like it has been for the past 40 years.

Enough is enough mate. Wake up to yourself.

I'll bet that if you had a poll to see how many would really like to go back to how it was before the white man came along, you wouldn't get too many takers. So the only other viable alternative they have is to go to school, join the white man and get a job or do something useful instead of having a four day party every time the welfare cheque arrives.

Don't try to tell me that it doesn't happen. I have lived there, I have friends who still live their who tell me what is happening. There are also many aboriginals who have done the right thing and got on with it, but the rest are just acting like a bunch of drunken sots who unfortunately seem incapable of any redemption, and I am not talking in any religious sense.

David

If all the "no assimilation" mob would just stop and read Jackson's tragic post again and try to imagine life as it lived by those sad little kids, they may not be such smart asses.
Children in such circumstances would be far better off away from those terrible conditions. They have no chance at all.

Our grandparents made decisions on culture.

Our parents made decisions on culture.

We made decisions on culture.

Our children make decisions on culture.

Our grandchildren make decisions on culture.

For each generation these decisions are the same and different, each with some pain, some gain.

For each generation it is what things each decides are relevant to them and their lives, what things each needs to live better the lives they want to live.

Are we living how our great grandparents expected us to live ?

Some of us make good decisions, some make bad decisions.

.

FrankGol I note you think that “Assimilation is soooooo monophonic. No one listens to that stuff anymore.”

so it is pretty obvious, you do not support “assimilation”.

There are only two choices – assimilation or not assimilation

That said, I would admit that regardless of how old the values are, I am pro-assimilation.

Why?

Because assimilation is the way of “inclusion” and of removing social barriers.

That is the way in which more can aspire to being treated equally.

So lets see who else supports your view and thinks assimilation is a bad thing

1 the Klu Klux Klan are against assimilation
2 The Apartheid government of South Africa was against assimilation
3 Ever small minded and frightened little tin pot dictator is against assimilation.

So I guess Frank, that sums up the sort of pond life who generally reject “assimilation”, the fascists, racists and kindred scumbags.

For myself, I support the leadership examples of Dr Martin Luther King and Nelson Mandela.

Whilst you are entitled to your view and I am entitled to mine, I can assure you, I am far more comfortable with the values of those who share the assimilation view to the ones you seem to be standing shoulder to shoulder with.

Perhaps readers would care to look at the statistics and other facets of employment of Aboriginals and Torres Strait Islanders in the Australian Public Service at http://www.apsc.gov.au/stateoftheservice/0405/indigenous/census2.htm

The number is somewhat in excess of the proportion of those claiming Aboriginality in the whole Australian population. It would seem that the government is doing more than a little bit towards giving employment to our native brethren.

Another statistic is the increase in the number of people claiming aboriginality from 1971 to 1991. If the number is to continue at the same rate until the end of the 21st century, there will then be 24 million people claiming aboriginality. Such a figure may be somewhat hypothetical, but I would suggest that assimilation may help produce something approaching that figure.

Col Rouge says: "There are only two choices – assimilation or not assimilation." And that's essentially authoritarian - a travesty of the concept of 'choice'. The earth is bipolar geographically, but politically and socially there are many choices. Assimilation is but one of a number of possibilities - there are various versions of democratic interaction including positive models of cultural diversity within a framework of common laws.

Col Rouge pulls one of the nastiest debating tricks in the book - guilt by contrived association. The Klu Klux Klan, the Apartheid government of South Africa and every tin pot dictator might have opposed assimilation.

But it's absurd to asssert that everyone who is against assimilation must be standing 'shoulder to shoulder' with 'fascists, racists and kindred scumbags'. Gutter tactics Col and illogical.

It also misrepresents these scumbags. They wanted total political and economic power, and claimed 'science' showed that people who were racially different were inferior. 'Science' legitimated their repressive regimes.

I oppose assimilation because it's been tried and discredited as a total failure with poisonous outcomes. In the real world, assimilation means that you pretend that everyone is the same with the same life chances and the same life choices, when they clearly have neither equality of opportunity nor equality of access to resources.

Assimilation means that you treat all people the same way despite their different needs. It means you expect all people to conform to some notion of 'normality' which the Col Rouges define. Assimilation means you won't and don't tolerate other world views.

Under assimilation THEY do all the changing because WE are superior and THEY are inferior. WE will make everyone the same as US because WE are best. Assimilation means THEY will only be worthy of support when WE decide THEY are like us.

In his illogical bipolar world of assimilation, Col is blind to alternative democratic processes such as Martin Luther King and Nelson Mandela struggled for. They would be appalled to have their name invoked as supporters of assimilation.

Whether readers agree with Andrew Jakubowicz's 'state of war' assertion or not, its clarification of complex social relationships through the metaphor of warfare, cuts to the very heart of one of the most important and hitherto unresolved issues facing every Australian.

Not only is the reader asked, "What will it take to make a peace in this troubled land? How do we end the war? What are the terms and conditions for building trust between the parties?", they are also encouraged to recognise that "Australian society needs to declare that it wants to make peace, and to espouse a peace plan".

However, much of the discussion on this thread not only enunciates denial of the state of war, but also its consequential unwillingness to peace. Even though the author described a return to assimilationist policy as a recent war strategy change, more recent posts wrangle with (its) propriety place in public policy.

Assimilation is not a one-way street. Non-indigenous Australians could also assimilate into a degree of aboriginality. Caring for country, for instance, could be assimilated into the cultural fabric of a more sustainable future-Australia.

Taken to the opposite extreme, where non-indigenous Australians may only function in conformity with indigenous tradition, the sensibilities of contributors to this debate might be so offended that they might just see the difficulty of contemporary assimilation, from an indigenous perspective

Any persons who wish to live apart from the greater Australian community ought to be able to, whether they are Aboriginal or not. They should also prove the courage of their convictions and forgo all dependencies on that greater community and not accept welfare, medical and dental, policing, educational or any other products of that society. Let each person assume responsibility for their own decisions and actions and stop with the moralist cultural babysitting. If the Aboriginal is to survive into the future let them do so on their own two feet as proud, independent people not manipulated by those of the "other" society whom think they are the moral and ethical conscious of the world.

Neil Hewett is right to remind us that Andrew Jakubowicz's 'state of war' metaphor of warfare cuts to the very heart of the unresolved issues facing every Australian and that "Australian society needs to declare that it wants to make peace, and to espouse a peace plan".

Neil says "Assimilation is not a one-way street. Non-indigenous Australians could also assimilate into a degree of aboriginality." And his example of caring for land is apposite.

However, Neil is using Assimilation in a particular way that is not recognisable to those who recall the one-way Assimilationism of the past as exemplified by the parallel White Australia policy, by dispossession and absorption and by the Stolen Generation.

Neil's concept of interaction might better be described as a mild form of Integration. His contribution takes no account of the core issues of power/powerlessness, racism, the centrality of land rights, structural inequality and the failure of recent governments to support reconciliation.

Unless we get to grips with those core issues, we will never be at peace in this country.

I disagree - of course, but FrankGol, let me tell you why:

Your core issues of:

* power/powerlessness,
* racism,
* the entrality of land rights,
* structural inequality, and
* the failure of recent governments to support reconciliation,

are all manifestations of Andrew Jakubowicz's 'state of war'; they are non-indigenous assessments.

The power to demand:

* equality under the law,
* compliance with anti-discrimination legislation,
* integrity of title, and
* dedication to reconciliation,

exists solely within the consciousness of non-indigenous Australia.

We must return, YET AGAIN, to the author's inquiry:

"What will it take to make peace in this troubled land? How do we end the war? What are the terms and conditions for building trust between the parties?"

History has (previously) foretold that 'truth' will set us free:

In truth, indigenous Australia has had a landscape care for its ancestors, whereas non-indigenous Australia has not; indigenous Australia has triumphed in sustainability stakes, where non-indigenous Australia has not!

Neil Hewett

How can one disagree that "The power to demand:
* equality under the law,
* compliance with anti-discrimination legislation,
* integrity of title, and
* dedication to reconciliation,
exists solely within the consciousness of non-indigenous Australia"?

But while it's one thing to demand those things, it's quite another thing to have those demands agreed to. People rarely give up power. They usually have to have it wrenched away from them. This is far more than an exercise in consciousness. It's a war.

Frankgol “In the real world, assimilation means that you pretend that everyone is the same with the same life chances and the same life choices, “

That is the aspiration, in your rejection of assimilation, you are rejecting that aspiration and replacing it with what? (as stated previously, the same dross as the KKK, SA Apartheid etc)

“when they clearly have neither equality of opportunity nor equality of access to resources.”

That may be the present “reality” but I ask again, what nobler goal could there be to aspire to treating all men are women as equals (regardless of resource distribution)?

What are you proposing in place of assimilation?

Oh frankgol, complain all you like about how I am using gutter debating tactics and I would ask you – defend yourself and come up with a real and “moral” alternative to assimilation but as it is, to reject assimilation, you must be accepting some form of separate and segregated development based on a less noble ideal than real human equality.

As for “In his illogical bipolar world of assimilation, Col is blind to alternative democratic processes such as Martin Luther King and Nelson Mandela struggled for. They would be appalled to have their name invoked as supporters of assimilation.”

“Assimilation” Here are a couple of definitions from dictionary.com

“people of different backgrounds come to see themselves as part of a larger national family “

“the social process of absorbing one cultural group into harmony with another “

Get this Frank, I think that is exactly what Dr Martin Luther King and Nelson Mandela stood for and what I would hope we could aspire to. Unfortunately we are continually obstructed by small minds who see assimilation as a threat and seek to maintain their small existence by obstructing the aspirational endeavours of others.

“bipolar”
“having two poles, as the earth.”
“Relating to a major affective disorder that is characterized by episodes of mania and depression.”

Wrong!

I am happy and consistent in my views and can relate the worth of separate values as to how they consistently reflect in each other.

Col Rouge, my reference to bipolar related to your authoritarian and limited view of choice of social policies. In your bipolar world-view you’re either for assimilation or you’re not; and if you’re not, you’re a supporter of the Klu Klux Klan, the Apartheid government of South Africa and every tin pot dictator might have opposed assimilation.

Repeating garbage doesn’t make it any truer Col. Not even when you deploy a sanctimonious display of anti-racism, and not even when you invoke the names of good people who struggled against assimilation equally as much as they struggled against racial and economic oppression.

Assimilation (notwithstanding your cherry-picked definitions) has demonstrably failed because it ignores power and inequality of resources and opportunity. It leaves little or no room for negotiation among unequal groups – every thing is on the terms of the power holders. And it denies minorities the right to self-determination.

What do Indigenous Autsralians think of assimilation? Here’s the National Indigenous Times last month:

“With the tenacious rolling back of basic rights, the neglect of key areas such as health, housing and education and the reintroduction of the ideologies of mainstreaming and assimilation, there is little wonder those working to end Indigenous disadvantage feel that nothing will move forward until Howard and his approach to Indigenous issues are on the scrap heap.” (http://www.nit.com.au/Opinion/story.aspx?id=11550)

You say, Col, that I have no alternatives. To quote my previous post: “Assimilation is but one of a number of possibilities - there are various versions of democratic interaction including positive models of cultural diversity within a framework of common laws.”

If you’re really interested in other options, you might care to read an Australian Parliamentary Briefing Paper called: ‘Indigenous Affairs in Australia, New Zealand, Canada, USA, Norway and Sweden’ (http://www.aph.gov.au/library/pubs/bp/1997-98/98bp15.htm)

But I doubt you'll read this - your world-view can't see over the horizon of assimilation.

Long-term COMMUNITY ENGAGEMENT or as you said "What are the terms and conditions for building trust between the parties?"

I find communities at all ground levels, are just the same as families when we consider the macro-micro parts which help glue "trust and equality"" in our human and daily inter-relationships.

Inclusive Vs Exclusive practices need focus. Breaking up government silo's, cultural getto's and in this case introducing the dire need to "Share Service Provision" - (Alma Ata, Alma Ata) is the civic perceptive that needs real political work from the bottom up, across all boundries, if social cohesion is desired!

I feel that our making-out 'War-like' (fear of tomorrow and control) is something we must ALL address. Attitude is everything. ie: Collective Securities - Demand a safer world for every ONE.

Good debate Andrew and unfortunately one we DO need to have if we are to understand what we are doing and WHAT is happening to us (each) in this period of Australia and ALL human existance.

http://www.miacat.com/
.

FrankGol, “With the tenacious rolling back of basic rights, the neglect of key areas such as health, housing and education and the reintroduction of the ideologies of mainstreaming and assimilation, there is little wonder those working to end Indigenous disadvantage feel that nothing will move forward until Howard and his approach to Indigenous issues are on the scrap heap.”

The above is not an issue of Aborigine community life per se. These effects are an issue of another "society" dictating and managing an others affairs regardless of culture, race, etc. It's another fine example of your oft lauded multiculturalism at work. Australia, nor any other country, "needs" a political/governmental, policy/department, that is caretaker or responsibility manager of any other peoples/society extricated from the overall function of the greater society by terms of culture.

The only way the Aboriginal culture of any country will survive is if it is by the efforts of that culture internally. Not the dictates of another external culture. This said, the Aborigines quality of life will continue to be manipulated and marginalised as long as they are dependent on the greater Australian society for their existence. The Aboriginal must be willing to take the steps necessary to free themselves from this bond of dependency.

No single person or group of persons can ever self-actualise while dependent on another person or group of persons.

The existence of a Multicultural and Indigenous Affairs Department with in government is criminal. It's physical and psychological enslavement through management policy of one over the other. Only the left think this is good government.

aqvarivs says:

“The existence of a Multicultural and Indigenous Affairs Department with in government is criminal. It's physical and psychological enslavement through management policy of one over the other. Only the left think this is good government.”

In fact, only the right could shoot itself in the foot so badly.

In November 2001, Howard merged the Department of Immigration and Multicultural Affairs with the Department of Reconciliation and Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Affairs to form the Department of Immigration and Multicultural and Indigenous Affairs. This was strenuously opposed by Indigenous groups who have never been comfortable with the concept of Multiculturalism because of its inherent connection with immigration.

Howard finally broke the nexus after five controversial years when he moved Indigenous Affairs in January 2006 to the Department of Families, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs (under Mal Brough).

As far as Multicultural Affairs is concerned, in January 2007 Howard renamed the Department of Immigration and Multicultural Affairs the Department of Immigration and Citizenship (Kevin Andrews the failed Minister for Workplace Relations took over this portfolio from Amanda Vanstone who is now learning Italian in Rome at taxpayer’s expense. Vanstone had replaced Ruddock in October 2003.)

Multiculturalism has been around in government bureaucracies for about 30 years and in only five of those years was it linked with Indigenous Affairs (and then only administratively). The policy links were never blended.

So aqvarivs it’s bizarre to assert as you did: “It's another fine example of your oft lauded multiculturalism at work.” It might be a help to get the basic facts and assumptions right before you shoot.

Incidentally the quote you attributed to me was from the National Indigenous Times: “With the tenacious rolling back of basic rights, the neglect of key areas such as health, housing and education and the reintroduction of the ideologies of mainstreaming and assimilation, there is little wonder those working to end Indigenous disadvantage feel that nothing will move forward until Howard and his approach to Indigenous issues are on the scrap heap."

FrankGol, get off the Howard bashing. No matter how much you write such drivel no one will believe Howard is responsible for Australian/Aboriginal realities. Multiculturalism is not a conservative methodology. It's part and parcel of the Liberal failed socialism and has proven to be as damaging and costly as the rest of the social welfare system. Howard is tying to do something. The next government will try to do something and so will the following government. All governments have tried to do something. Such doing should be left to the Aborigine.

Those outside of the Aborigine community who are also dependent on the greater society exhibit the same thinking and behavior patterns. Skin colour and cultural experiences not big factors in the overall scheme of poor life choices and management skills. Alcohol abuse, drugs, displaced families, higher incidences of sexual abuse and family violence the common denominator.

I didn't attribute anything to you but used quotes to highlight the section I took from your post. Whoever wrote it is speaking about the effects of being as a people managed by political and government policy. I'll say it again. In my opinion such attitudes and actions are criminal and equal physical and psychological enslavement through management policy of one people/group over the other. Only the left think this is good government or even government business. Most Conservatives don't want the government involved in the business of managing Aboriginal life or culture, or anyone elses culture for that matter. Multiculturalism and Indigenous Affairs is institutionalised dependency on government. Not a good thing people being institutionalised through government policy.
My facts are straight and I make no assumptions. That's your bit.

aqvarivs says:

“The existence of a Multicultural and Indigenous Affairs Department with in government is criminal. It's physical and psychological enslavement through management policy of one over the other. Only the left think this is good government.”

So I point out that there is no such Department. Hasn't been one since January 2006.

aqvarivs replies: "My facts are straight..."

Can someone ring up the PM and tell him the old Department seems to be still running? It's criminal!

Frankgol asserts,"they changed their name therefore they no longer exist. Get a grip Frank. Your defensive posture of using ridicule and obfuscation is hardly showing your years. Multiculturalism and Aboriginal Affairs are still folders with in State and Federal Governments. The government (by whichever party) can rename each and every sitting but, it is meaningless as long as government adopts a mother knows best attitude and sends the socialist into the Aboriginal communities in order to direct government policy vis a vie Indigenous affairs. Culturally or otherwise.